Talk:feminism

I'm not sure how to change this without opening up a hornet's nest (Pandora's box?), but the present definition (movement promoting gender equality or whatever) seems to miss the feminine aspect. -dmh 21:44, 30 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I think they should create a new name for gender equality and change feminism to promoting female superiority. just as you wouldn't call somebody for race equality a 'caucasionist'. anonymous 13:55, 8 Aug 2007 (AEST)

Yes, I agree that the current definition seems to be pushing a Point of View, and appears politically correct and protective of feminism. It should read more like "advocacy of women's rights and interests, politically and socially." Would something like this be better? -- Thisis0 04:13, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

feminism is NOT the belief of female superiority. that is bullshit propagated by misogynistic males who dislike the feminist movement. disgusting. —This unsigned comment was added by 86.179.131.94 (talk) at 02:39, May 17, 2010.

I find it most ironic, when seeing comments such as above, that femina (as in feminism) originally meant "the one who perfoms fellatio", but is nowadays used as a self-designation by militant androphobes to battle the prejudices inherent in their designation. I wonder how many other such "historical contranyms" there are. --Ivan Štambuk 08:38, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

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"A belief in the superiority of women." (simplified from a rather more prolix recent addition) Equinox◑ 12:08, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

This is a tough one. Here in the U.S., it's obvious that many people treat the word "feminism" as a dirty one, whereas no one seems to have anything against "gender equality"; but when you try to pin down what exactly the "feminism"-haters think "feminism" means, you don't get anything easily translated into a dictionary definition. (See e.g. http://quietube.com/v.php/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pdbnzFUsXI.) Maybe our sense #2 should just be Used pejoratively.? Also, we might want to split the "social theory" and the "political movement" into two separate defs. —RuakhTALK 14:30, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

As you say. I had started to look at bgc, but was overwhelmed by the women's studies literature. It just occurred to me that the right search might be for "man-hating / man-hater" and "feminism" to try to get evidence to infer a pejorative definition. It isn't really good form to build a definition solely around a tag like "pejorative" or, worse, "ironic", is it? DCDuringTALK 15:53, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Feminism has been supportive of writers such as Valerie Solanas with titles such as SCUM Society for Cutting Up Men —This unsigned comment was added by 85.226.4.185 (talk) at 01:31, 22 December 2009 (UTC).

The question at hand is this: what does the word feminism mean? In other words, when people use the word feminism, what are they referring to? Your statement seems to be a statement about feminism, i.e. about the feminist movement, rather than about the word feminism itself. That is, you seem to be presupposing that, regardless of our individual opinions about the movement, we all mean the same thing by the word itself. (By comparison: suppose that you think Cleveland sucks, whereas I think it rocks. We still mean the same thing by the place-name Cleveland, we just have different opinions about the place we're both referring to.) —RuakhTALK 18:35, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

The word sounds familiar to me, I know I've heard it. Not that that makes it meet cfi or anything .....L☺g☺maniac☃ 02:11, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Better written as: 'the belief that only women are human beings, while all men are animals' —This unsigned comment was added by 122.160.231.174 (talk) at 13:18, 29 December 2009 (UTC).

In these edits, two senses were added, with edit summaries suggesting the edits were motivated in part by a desire to have parallel definitions at feminism and masculism. But these words are used differently, as previous RFVs have shown. I've removed the sense that was semi-redundant to the attested sense but with wording like that of the sense which failed RFV above. - -sche(discuss) 20:26, 9 December 2012 (UTC) - -sche(discuss) 20:26, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

The 'different uses' of the terms are situational. People also use 'masculism' to describe a male equivalent of the accepted feminism definition, just as people use 'feminism' to describe a female version of the accepted version of 'masculism'.

"Advocacy of the rights of women, or promotion of values which are seen to be typically female"

That's what was added, and that is an appropriate usage of feminism. People do not merely use feminism to refer to equality-based aims. Radical feminism includes descriptions of feminists who levy for non-equality based things such as female rulership over men. 'Radfem' communities also discuss things like wiping men out to reduce their population % or preferentially aborting male children. Etym (talk) 05:58, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

I've never heard of gendercide against men happening, and only preferential abortions of female children. Can you attest the sense you think we should add? ~ Röbin Liönheart (talk) 08:53, 11 December 2012 (UTC)